State AG Opinions
Free state attorney general opinions with plain-English summaries, full citations, and the original source on every page.
No opinions match these filters
Try fewer or different words, check the spelling, or clear the filters to browse everything.
Do you need a license to practice psychotherapy, hypnosis, or biofeedback in Texas?
The Attorney General concluded that yes, in 1995, practicing psychotherapy, hypnosis for health care purposes, hypnotherapy, or biofeedback for compensation without a Texas psychology license…
Could a South Carolina school district offer its own employee cafeteria plan alongside the state plan in 1995?
No, under the 1995 informal opinion. The AG office adhered to its earlier interpretation that school districts could participate only in the Retirement System cafeteria plan, even where the proposed…
Did Greenville-Spartanburg Airport police have general statewide arrest powers in 1995?
For officers other than the chief, the 1995 opinion said their commissions granted statewide authority only when they were performing airport-police duties. Outside those duties, the writer said…
Can a NY city require its city council to confirm the mayor's appointments to the planning commission?
Yes. The AG concluded that mayoral appointment subject to city council confirmation does not conflict with General Municipal Law § 234 or General City Law § 27. When an executive appoints and the…
Can someone serve on the city council if they also work as a city firefighter?
No. The AG concluded the offices are incompatible. The city council controls the fire department's budget, including firefighters' salaries and benefits, so a council member who is also a…
Can a Texas justice of the peace court handle underage drinking cases?
The Attorney General concluded that no, justice courts (justice of the peace courts) did not have jurisdiction over prosecutions for a minor's purchase, consumption, or being furnished alcohol under…
Could a Delaware school district charge for staff time spent gathering public records, on top of copying fees, under the old FOIA fee rules?
No, under the law and the district's own regulation as they stood in 1995. The AG ordered the Woodbridge School District to refund $89.94 to a resident after finding the district charged her for six…
Was a certified-mail receipt enough to convict someone of passing a bad check in South Carolina in 1995?
No. The 1995 informal opinion said a bad-check prosecution still needed evidence of the offense and proof beyond a reasonable doubt when contested. It also said the statute did not require a…
Could a precious-metals dealer get a South Carolina permit for a flea-market booth leased for a year in 1995?
No. The 1995 informal opinion said the statute expressly treated a flea market as a temporary location from which a precious-metals dealer could not operate. A one-year lease supported permanency…
Can a New York non-charter county create a county administrator position without a public vote?
Yes. The AG concluded that a non-charter county board of supervisors may use Municipal Home Rule Law § 10 to create the position by local law. As long as the local law does not abolish, transfer, or…
Can the same person sit on both a town's zoning board of appeals and its board of assessment review?
Yes. No statute prohibits the combination, and the offices are compatible under the common-law Ryan v Green test: neither is subordinate to the other, and their duties (hearing zoning-enforcement…
Does changing how the mayor is chosen in a small commission-run city require voter approval?
Yes. The AG concluded the Sherrill charter amendment, which would transfer the power to serve as commission chair and mayor from the top vote-getting commissioner to the commissioner with the most…
Can a town assessor privately represent a property owner who also owns property in his own town?
No, not without resolving the overlap. The AG concluded the situation creates at least an appearance of impropriety because the public would reasonably question whether the assessor can value the…
Can the NC House of Representatives adopt a rule that limits how many bills each individual member may introduce, or does that violate some constitutional right of legislators to introduce as many bills as they want?
The House can adopt such a rule. Members of the NC House do not have a constitutional or inherent right to introduce unlimited bills. Historically, in both the U.S. Congress and the NC House,…
Did Connecticut’s nonprofit Student Loan Foundation have to open its records and meetings under FOIA?
The AG said the Connecticut Student Loan Foundation was a public agency for FOIA purposes despite its nonprofit corporate form. Its statutory creation, educational function, public funding and…
Did Connecticut towns have to audit contractor payrolls and confine state-contract employment rules to one grant project?
The AG answered several audit questions. The cited payroll amendment required municipalities to receive certified contractor payrolls, not routinely test them. The single-audit public-hospital…
Does a NY town have to pay for a town board member's defense in a defamation suit by the police chief?
The opinion does not decide whether this board member is owed a defense; the town board must determine the relevant facts. Under Public Officers Law § 18, an allegation that conduct occurred within…
Can a New York town let appointed officials live anywhere in the state instead of inside the town?
Yes, by local law. The AG concluded that the Public Officers Law residency rule no longer applies uniformly to all towns (a Greenburgh-only exception made it a 'special' law), so a town may use its…
Do members of a town conservation board have to live in the town?
No, when the board is strictly advisory. The AG concluded that because the Town of Mendon's conservation board had no decision-making power and only made recommendations to the planning board, its…
Did a volunteer Group 3 constable’s training qualify him to run for sheriff in South Carolina in 1995?
No, on the facts reported in 1995. The writer said the volunteer Group 3 constable’s 48-hour course and annual in-service training did not make him a certified law enforcement officer with the…
Could The Citadel’s state-constable campus officers carry pistols off duty and make arrests statewide in 1995?
Yes, under the circumstances described in the 1995 informal opinion. The writer said The Citadel’s officers were covered by the constable pistol exception even off duty and had statewide arrest…
Could Connecticut regulate boxing matches on the Mashantucket Pequot reservation or provide event services there?
The AG said Connecticut could not impose its civil boxing regulations on Mashantucket Pequot reservation events. State participation had been voluntary, and the cited Employment Rights Act barred…
Can a town stop plowing a road for the winter if one family living on it depends on it for access?
No. Highway Law § 205-a forbids designating a town road as a 'seasonal limited use highway' (which lets the town drop snow removal from December through March) if even one occupied residence or…
Can a sitting county manager be appointed to the NC Property Tax Commission, and if so, when does the county manager's role create a conflict that requires recusal from particular Commission decisions?
Yes. The AG found no categorical conflict or incompatible-office bar to a county manager serving on the Property Tax Commission. The member must disqualify from appeals involving the member’s…
Does the State Controller's statutory duty to 'exercise general coordinating authority for all telecommunications matters relating to the internal management and operations' of state agencies under G.S. 143B-426.35 cover the University of North Carolina system and its constituent campuses, or are the universities outside the State Controller's reach?
Yes, the AG concluded the State Controller's general coordinating authority covers the UNC system and its constituent universities. G.S. 143B-426.35(3) gives the Controller coordinating authority…
Did a Kentucky deputy county judge/executive have to post an official bond?
The AG found no state statute requiring a deputy county judge/executive to post a bond before taking office or while serving. It distinguished the county judge/executive, whose bond was expressly…
When North Carolina county boards of elections charge the public for copies of voter registration lists, what counts as 'actual cost' under G.S. § 163-82.10(b), and who gets to decide the amount?
Only out-of-pocket reproduction costs. The AG concluded 'actual cost' covered paper, ink, and the price of blank disks or tapes, but not labor, depreciation, electricity, heat, or prorated rent,…
Could one Texas city charge impact fees and include capital improvements for service provided inside another city?
Under the law in 1995, a municipality could contract with another municipality to provide capital improvements inside the second city and could charge impact fees there if the contract authorized…
Are prevailing-wage payroll records that contractors file with Delaware's Department of Labor public records?
Mostly yes, under the law as it stood in 1995. The AG concluded that sworn payroll records contractors file with the Department of Labor under the prevailing wage law are public records subject to…
Could Union County accept private donations restricted to the Susan Smith prosecution in 1995?
The 1995 opinion said Union County could accept private contributions for the Susan Smith case, with important conditions. Funds restricted to that case had to be used for it or could revert to…
When a Minnesota county-seat-removal petition needs signatures equal to 60% of those who voted in the last general election, does that mean only people who actually voted can sign? And do signers have to be registered voters?
No to both. The AG read the 60-percent requirement as a count, not a substantive limit on who can sign. Any legal voter of the county may sign, whether or not they voted in the previous election.…
Does Delaware's open records law give the public access to Court on the Judiciary disciplinary proceedings?
No, under the law as it stood in 1995. The AG found that proceedings before Delaware's Court on the Judiciary are not subject to FOIA's open meeting requirements, because the Court's deliberations…
If a planning board member declares a conflict of interest, do they have to leave the room during deliberations?
Yes. The AG concluded that once a planning board member has declared a conflict of interest, recusal must mean physically absenting themselves from the board's proceedings on the matter, not just…
Can a New York county transfer jurisdiction of a bridge back to the town where it sits?
Yes. After amending the county road system map to include the bridge, the county may follow Highway Law §§ 115-b and 115-c to transfer it back to the town. The process requires a written agreement…
Can a Delaware school board avoid the state's open meeting law by calling a gathering an informal 'breakfast meeting'?
Yes. The opinion found that when a quorum of the Woodbridge School District's Board attended a monthly staff breakfast where invited employees discussed suggestions for the school system in their…
Could Horry County council members both impose a road-maintenance fee and direct spending in their districts in 1995?
The 1995 opinion said the state constitutional separation-of-powers problem that barred a legislative delegation from directing state C-fund spending did not apply to Horry County Council. It…
Did South Carolina’s court-interpreter statute require interpreters for every deaf juvenile in a juvenile-justice facility in 1995?
No. The 1995 opinion read the cited statute as providing interpreters for legal proceedings involving a deaf person, including one confined in an institution, rather than for every interaction in a…
Can a North Carolina state senator (or representative) keep an existing appointment to the State Board of Education after being sworn into the legislature, or does the state constitution force the appointee to give one of the seats up?
The legislator must give up the Board seat by operation of law. North Carolina's separation-of-powers clause forbids a legislator from concurrently exercising executive power on a state board or…
Can any Texas peace officer enforce a city's ordinances?
The Attorney General concluded that articles 2.12 and 2.13 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the statutes that list who counts as a peace officer and set out a peace officer's general duties, do…
Can a Texas county pay to fly in a job candidate for an interview?
The Attorney General concluded that yes, in some circumstances. A county commissioners court may pay the travel expenses of someone applying for a county job, such as a county forensic pathologist…
Could Connecticut pay overdue reimbursements for blind students even if checks issued this year exceeded the annual cap?
The AG said the Board of Education and Services for the Blind could pay towns overdue special education reimbursements in a year when aggregate checks exceeded the annual statutory limit, provided…
Could Washington agencies embargo every food product from an area near a nuclear accident?
The Attorney General concluded in 1995 that Agriculture and Health could not embargo all products solely because they came from a modeled food-control area. The laws examined required a…
Is the Delaware Board of Bar Examiners subject to the state's Freedom of Information Act?
No. The opinion found the Board of Bar Examiners was a de facto arm of the Delaware Supreme Court, created under the Court's exclusive constitutional authority over bar admissions, so it fell…
Could Connecticut review a new FM antenna on an older cable television tower despite FCC control of radio interference?
The AG said adding an FM antenna to an existing cable television tower was a physical modification the Connecticut Siting Council could regulate, even though the tower predated the council’s…
Did a student-funded UConn radio tower count as a state tower for Connecticut siting review?
The AG concluded that WHUS’s proposed radio tower fell within the Siting Council’s jurisdiction as a state-owned or state-operated tower. Although student activity fees funded WHUS, UConn held the…
Can Texas pay a finder's fee for tips that help recover permanent school fund property?
The Attorney General concluded that no, the state could not use the comptroller's contingency-fee contracts under section 403.0195 of the Government Code to pay for tips that helped recover property…
Does a Texas police department have to fingerprint you for free if you ask?
The Attorney General concluded that yes. Section 80.001 of the Human Resources Code required every state and local law enforcement agency in Texas to fingerprint a person on request, and to do it…
Could South Carolina’s vocational rehabilitation agency keep federal reallotment money for later capital projects in 1995?
Yes, under the 1992–93 appropriation provisions analyzed in 1995. The opinion said federal reallotment funds budgeted for approved long-term capital improvements did not have to be remitted to the…
Could the Texas Department of Insurance regulate viatical settlement companies under the 1993 law?
The Attorney General concluded that no, it could not. The 1993 statute that purported to give the Texas Department of Insurance jurisdiction over viatical settlements (the business of buying the…
Did a South Carolina physician have to disclose publicly traded stock before referring a patient to the company’s subsidiary in 1995?
No, if the investment met the 1993 Act’s publicly held corporation exception as described in the opinion. The writer said a physician could refer patients to the corporation’s diagnostic-services…
If city police arrest someone for a state crime, does the county jail have to take them?
The Attorney General concluded that yes, once a magistrate signed a commitment order for a person arrested on a state criminal charge, the county jail had to take custody and the sheriff could not…
If a North Carolina patient never signed a living will, is the procedure in the Right to Natural Death Act the only legal way a doctor can withhold life-sustaining treatment?
No. The procedure in N.C.G.S. § 90-322 is optional and nonexclusive. A physician who follows it gets an absolute statutory defense; a physician who acts outside it is not unlawful, but is judged by…
Could a South Carolina textile processor claim a lien on a customer's patterns and screens ahead of a bank's security interest?
The 1995 AG concluded that the processor's lien covered the customer's patterns and screens, as well as fabric, while the processor held them. Assuming its work was in the ordinary course of…
Could a Kentucky sheriff use county license plates on a privately owned vehicle and receive mileage pay?
The AG said a privately owned sheriff's or deputy's vehicle could not lawfully be registered in the county's name or carry county plates. The county could reimburse documented official-business…
Can a Minnesota county pay its top administrator a $600-per-month car allowance on top of the maximum salary capped at 95% of the governor's pay? And does the 1993 severance-pay cap apply retroactively to a contract signed before its effective date?
Auto allowance: probably exceeds the cap as drafted. A monthly auto allowance that subsidizes personal use of the administrator's vehicle, with no apportionment between business and personal use,…
If a North Carolina school district accidentally overpays a teacher, can the district take the money back? Or does the district have to eat the loss?
The district can recover the money. N.C. Gen. Stat. §§ 115C-302(a)(4) and 115C-316(a)(6) tell the State and the local board which one absorbs the loss as between them (the local board does, when…
Could a Washington county treasurer charge mosquito and weed-control programs for collecting assessments?
Under the 1994 statutes, the AG said the treasurer could charge a cost-based fee for collecting a mosquito district's special assessments, but not for county-levied noxious-weed assessments or…
If a NC Coastal Resources Commission member moves outside the coastal area (or even outside North Carolina), does that change of residence automatically vacate their seat, or can they finish their existing term? And could a non-NC resident be reappointed?
The member can finish the existing term even if the residency mix on the Commission becomes inconsistent with § 113A-104(e). The statute's residency caps restrict the Governor's appointment power at…
Can a North Carolina bank pledge its own assets to secure a customer's deposits above the FDIC limit? When is a customer's money 'public' for that purpose?
Only with express statutory authority. State banks cannot pledge assets to secure private deposits. Public deposits can be secured under statutes like §§ 159-30(b) and 159-31(b), but only if the…
Does North Carolina's 1993 'safe and sane' pyrotechnics law override an older Forsyth County local act that defined pyrotechnics differently?
Yes, by implied repeal. When a later statewide statute and an older local act define the same thing in irreconcilable ways, the later statewide law controls if the legislature's intent to apply it…
How these opinions are useful
- Understand state law: AG opinions are authoritative interpretations of how state law applies.
- Persuasive authority: Not binding like court decisions, but they carry significant weight.
- Government guidance: Often clarify how state agencies and officials should interpret statutes.
- Legal research: Cite AG opinions in letters, motions, and legal arguments.
Browse opinions by state
Two states are not listed and are not pending: New Hampshire publishes its opinions on a page that automated retrieval cannot read, and Rhode Island publishes no complete full-text archive at all. We will add them if that changes.